Pastor Talk: The Babe

You were born in a delivery room, or at home or in a taxi, mother, father, doctor or midwife present: a peaceful though terrifying change from nine months' life in darkness, then... Light. Faces. Unfamiliar sights. Voices. Huge eyes. Poking, prodding and ouch. What is that loud wailing? Oh, it's me. I'm crying. I've been born.

Jesus' birth was much the same. The hushed voices of his parents were the only human sounds amid bleatings and mooings of a barn. The smells were strong. What did he know? this ancient, eternal Son of God without beginning, made flesh, a small baby man. The babe lay in a food trough, hay crunching under his wrappings. The little king looked up at the strange world he had created, and was now part of, subject to its laws, part of a covenant people, born to be their one true sacrifice, born to die.

He must have been a perfect baby. Of course he wet, he hungered, he feared, needed his parents — the Mother so much a part of him, he a part of her, and this step-father caring for his infant heir; heir to the line of the kings, a thousand-years descendant from David.

Immediately the world changed around him. Shepherds heard wonderful news from the sky, angels singing praises to God for the Savior born in Bethlehem. They left their flocks and ran to be his witnesses.

A new light appeared in the heavens as men of wisdom in the East watched the heavenly signs unfold. They knew what it meant: a star out of Jacob who would rule the world. They packed precious gifts and mounted their camels.

From that night to this, the babe is celebrated, longed for, rejoiced in, sung about, fashioned in plaster, paint, dolls and our imagination. That star hangs over towns and nativity scenes, marking the magi's way to him who must be worshipped.

Remarkably, his birthplace was so humble; the king of the world is born in a barn. Now great cathedrals rise in cities where high altars soar and giant organs trumpet through the night the familiar music of Christmas.

We would all give him our home, our bed, were he to ask it. He is asking us to give him — not our sleeping quarters: somewhere else. He wants to be born in our hearts.

The wonder of Christmas calls us back through years, to travel in our hearts to when we believed because, well just because we believed. He wants to be born in our hearts.

No room — not at the little inn. He wants to be born in our hearts.

We say "I invite Jesus into my heart." Some say we have to say that to get a key to heaven. Then what? He wants to be born in our hearts.

Jesus, the babe, born for all mankind, seeks a place to dwell that was once cold and dark. I call it "my heart." It isn't any good to me alone. It was made for him. There isn't room anywhere else. Though it be the lowest and dirtiest place on earth, the King of Kings will make it his palace. May he be born in me. And be born in you.

"And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." He shrouded himself in human flesh, God incarnate, a complete man, a newborn babe, still powerful to create galaxies, yet powerless to feed himself. He needed us, though he created us and will be our judge.

Christmas, feast of new beginnings, offers us this hope: That we can start again, with new faith and great hope, that we might never fall so low again.

A new star shines in the sky. Angels sing in the heavens. A babe cries out in the night from a barn in old Bethlehem. Here in the 21st century, with all our toys, with our noses pressed against store windows, plentiful room just to come in and buy &amp We must step back. We've just been offered eternity. He wants to be born in our hearts.

Welcome Lord Jesus, God made man, born in us Christmas Eve, giving us new lives. The world has nothing we need. You have all that we want. You want to be born in our hearts.

You are born tonight. You are here. Welcome baby king.

Rev. Peter F. Hansen is rector of St. Augustine of Canterbury Anglican Church in Chico.